Harvick emerges with win

Published: Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at 12:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Monday, November 12, 2012 at 10:34 p.m.

During the past 36 hours, descriptions of Sunday's Sprint Cup race at Phoenix International Raceway have been summed as wild, crazy and bizarre. Unbelievable and shocking may be more appropriate.

A late-race rub, an on-track retaliation and a massive fight between crew members overshadowed a huge development in this year's championship battle. Hendrick Motorsports driver Jimmie Johnson crashed and gave Penske Racing's Brad Keselowski a decisive lead going into Homestead-Miami Speedway next Sunday.

Then to top everything, Welcome's Kevin Harvick put RCR Enterprises team back in victory lane after a 44-race winless slide. His 2012 Sprint Cup season has been filled with a great deal of disappointment. Even though he was among the 12 drivers who made this year's Chase, he has found himself struggling to build a consistent title run.

Over the weekend, the story broke late last week that Harvick seems set to leave RCR in 2014 for a fourth team at Stewart-Haas Racing.

"Regardless of what happens in 2014, we have the end of this year, and we've got all of next year," Harvick said. "We want to win races and we want to be competitive, and that is what we're here to do.

"Regardless of what happens on the business side of things, Richard Childress and myself will always be friends. We may agree to disagree, but we still have a lot of racing left to do, and we owe it to our sponsors and our company to go out and do exactly what we did [Sunday]."

Added Childress, "You know, everybody has worked hard all year long and did a whole lot, and there's no question about it, we got a little behind on some of (the) stuff that people were doing. It put us behind, and you know, we didn't get the year we wanted, but to come out with a win, it was big, and I couldn't be prouder of this whole team."

Harvick has had good years with Childress. Nineteen Sprint Cup wins, a fourth-place finish in points in 2006 and third in the 2010 and 2011 seasons are impressive along with Nationwide Series championships in 2001 and 2006.

He seems ready for 2012 to end and says he will be focused for the 2013 season without thinking of 2014.

"There can be distractions, whatever can be happening around the race track, off the track," Harvick said. "But when you get in that garage, everybody is doing their jobs. I get in the car, [Childress] is up on [top of] the trailer. I mean, we're all just racers in the end. We want to race cars, and it comes with a lot of media. It comes with a lot of things outside of the race track."

At Phoenix, Harvick had to endure a frustrating red-flag period with three laps remaining after tempers erupted between Jeff Gordon, Clint Bowyer and their pit crews. Gordon purposely wrecked Bowyer after first being tapped by Bowyer in the closing laps, taking out a number of cars. What developed over the next 15 minutes was a rather ugly scene with Bowyer physically running through the pits and garage looking to join the fight.

Bowyer surprisingly emerged unscathed, but NASCAR slapped Gordon with a loss of 25 championship points, a $100,000 fine and probation. Brian Pattie, Bowyer's crew chief, was fined $25,000 for not keeping control of his crew. Gordon's team owner Rick Hendrick also lost points, while crew chief Alan Gustafson was placed on probation.

Meanwhile, Harvick thought he had made it to the white flag, which would have ended the race. NASCAR said no and made the remainder of the field race for it before the biggest pile-up of the day occurred.

"Obviously, we didn't want to see the red flag," Harvick said. "Best I've heard it, we were about five feet (from crossing under the white flag). I saw the caution light come on, and I saw the flag before we had gotten to the start-finish line. At that point, you think, 'Man, it's 2012. What's going to go wrong? Where are we going to run out of gas?'

Finally, something went right.

Finally, Keselowski was fined $25,000 for calculating points numbers on his cell phone while in his car. Could this race have gotten any crazier? Probably not.

<p>During the past 36 hours, descriptions of Sunday's Sprint Cup race at Phoenix International Raceway have been summed as wild, crazy and bizarre. Unbelievable and shocking may be more appropriate. </p><p>A late-race rub, an on-track retaliation and a massive fight between crew members overshadowed a huge development in this year's championship battle. Hendrick Motorsports driver Jimmie Johnson crashed and gave Penske Racing's Brad Keselowski a decisive lead going into Homestead-Miami Speedway next Sunday.</p><p>Then to top everything, Welcome's Kevin Harvick put RCR Enterprises team back in victory lane after a 44-race winless slide. His 2012 Sprint Cup season has been filled with a great deal of disappointment. Even though he was among the 12 drivers who made this year's Chase, he has found himself struggling to build a consistent title run. </p><p>Over the weekend, the story broke late last week that Harvick seems set to leave RCR in 2014 for a fourth team at Stewart-Haas Racing.</p><p>"Regardless of what happens in 2014, we have the end of this year, and we've got all of next year," Harvick said. "We want to win races and we want to be competitive, and that is what we're here to do.</p><p>"Regardless of what happens on the business side of things, Richard Childress and myself will always be friends. We may agree to disagree, but we still have a lot of racing left to do, and we owe it to our sponsors and our company to go out and do exactly what we did [Sunday]."</p><p>Added Childress, "You know, everybody has worked hard all year long and did a whole lot, and there's no question about it, we got a little behind on some of (the) stuff that people were doing. It put us behind, and you know, we didn't get the year we wanted, but to come out with a win, it was big, and I couldn't be prouder of this whole team."</p><p>Harvick has had good years with Childress. Nineteen Sprint Cup wins, a fourth-place finish in points in 2006 and third in the 2010 and 2011 seasons are impressive along with Nationwide Series championships in 2001 and 2006.</p><p>He seems ready for 2012 to end and says he will be focused for the 2013 season without thinking of 2014. </p><p>"There can be distractions, whatever can be happening around the race track, off the track," Harvick said. "But when you get in that garage, everybody is doing their jobs. I get in the car, [Childress] is up on [top of] the trailer. I mean, we're all just racers in the end. We want to race cars, and it comes with a lot of media. It comes with a lot of things outside of the race track."</p><p>At Phoenix, Harvick had to endure a frustrating red-flag period with three laps remaining after tempers erupted between Jeff Gordon, Clint Bowyer and their pit crews. Gordon purposely wrecked Bowyer after first being tapped by Bowyer in the closing laps, taking out a number of cars. What developed over the next 15 minutes was a rather ugly scene with Bowyer physically running through the pits and garage looking to join the fight. </p><p>Bowyer surprisingly emerged unscathed, but NASCAR slapped Gordon with a loss of 25 championship points, a $100,000 fine and probation. Brian Pattie, Bowyer's crew chief, was fined $25,000 for not keeping control of his crew. Gordon's team owner Rick Hendrick also lost points, while crew chief Alan Gustafson was placed on probation. </p><p>Meanwhile, Harvick thought he had made it to the white flag, which would have ended the race. NASCAR said no and made the remainder of the field race for it before the biggest pile-up of the day occurred. </p><p>"Obviously, we didn't want to see the red flag," Harvick said. "Best I've heard it, we were about five feet (from crossing under the white flag). I saw the caution light come on, and I saw the flag before we had gotten to the start-finish line. At that point, you think, 'Man, it's 2012. What's going to go wrong? Where are we going to run out of gas?'</p><p>Finally, something went right.</p><p>Finally, Keselowski was fined $25,000 for calculating points numbers on his cell phone while in his car. Could this race have gotten any crazier? Probably not.</p><p>Ben White is a motorsports columnist for The Dispatch.</p>